At the start of the Lewisham East Parliamentary by-election, I wrote: In 2017 the Liberal Democrats polled 4.4% in her Lewisham East seat. However back in 2010 the party was up on 28.2%: this seat is more promising territory than that 4.4% may make it look at first glance. Especially as the best calculations put the Remain vote at the European Referendum on 65-66% in this constituency. In the local elections last week, the Liberal Democrats were on 13%... A big challenge for the Lib Dems, as those local election figures show, will be to make a strong and quick ...

The saga of the proposals for 137 homes on Foldgate Lane has been a long and difficult one. The final proposals have now been submitted. Overall, they look good. There some details to be resolved and some to challenge. These include access arrangements to Foldgate Lane and public transport. Putting aside that this development being in the wrong place and the problems of access, this application for detailed planning permission has been well put together. The housing is at a low density and the layout is spacious and green. One quarter of the housing will be affordable. Permission for this ...

We join Lord Bonkers for another week at the Hall to find him, though as ready with an apposite quotation as ever, uncharacteristically nettled by criticism in the village. Monday "London, to thee I do present the merry month of May," as the dramatists Beaumont and Fletcher wrote. Except by the time you read this it will not be May at all but June. Used as I have become to the electric internet, I now find the inescapable delay between the submission of these diaries and their appearance in the next Liberator frustrating. Will my observations on, say, the Master ...

Not to begrudge the others which have made it to the ballot in recent years, but I am ever so slightly relieved that the Best Related Work ballot consists solely of actual books this year, for the first time since 2010; it's easier to compare apples with apples than with oranges. This year is also likely to be the first year since 2013 that a Hugo for Best Related Work is presented in the USA, as the category was the only one to be No-Awarded in both slate years. They're all good enough books. Of the Harlan Ellison biography, I ...

Current The Art of Starving, by Sam J. Miller Ghana Must Go, by Taiye Selasie City of Stairs, by Robert Jackson Bennett Last books finished Stories of the Maksura, by Martha Wells Six Wakes, by Mur Lafferty Gemini, by Dorothy Dunnett Introduction to the Stormlight Archive for Hugo Voters, by Brandon Sanderson Next books Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch Virgins, Weeders and Queens, by Twigs Way Old Friends, by Jonathan Clements, Marc Platt and Pete Kempshall

The drafting advice deadline is Wednesday at 13.00. Yes, this Wednesday. Yes, it has come around quickly, hasn't it? The technical issue that plagued submissions for drafting advice for Southport conference has now been resolved, and I have already had a couple of things land in my inbox. If you want your submission to add to my workload, best get your skates on. Please note not all submissions will come to me for advice, in fact most won't. Your investment can go up down sideways and peppermint (PS: do let me know ASAP if you attempt to obtain drafting advice ...

DiscoverEU | European Youth Portal Are you 18, or do you know an 18-year-old, in the EU? (UK still counts!) The EU is offering *free passes* this summer which will allow you and up to four friends to travel around the continent. See here for details of how to apply. If you like what you see here (or even if you don't) please consider dropping me a tip: [IMG: Paypal Donate Button] [IMG: Buy Me an uncaffeinated beverage (because I'm allergic to coffee) at ko-fi.com] [IMG: comment count unavailable] comments

Every by-election has a tipping point. You either have the momentum, or you do not. I know I was closely involved in the Bermondsey by-election, where we proved that one of Labour's fiefdoms could be demolished by Liberal activism. I must tell you that this weekend the Leegate Centre had the buzz of a Party whose Liberal philosophy, which fights against Labour state control or Tory neoliberalism, is unstoppable. Liberal Democrat activists were dedicated and inspired. I spent Saturday afternoon on the doorstep in a former Conservative ward. I can tell you that most began as undecided but were happy ...

The expected collapse of Poundworld is now official.. But that's not the end of the bad economic news today. The run of closures and downsizing in the retail sector can in part be blamed on a failure of companies to keep up with the changes in how people shop. But how is the significant drop in UK industrial output of 0.8% in April, compared to March, announced today, to be explained? Even more

Last night at the London Muslim Centre in Whitechapel there was a particularly joyful Iftar dinner in honour of Malaysian politician Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who was released from prison last month after a decade of incarceration, most of it in solitary confinement. As the charges against him were widely seen as fabricated, one might [...]

On Wednesday last week I was nearly late for my afternoon meetings at Gateshead Civic Centre as another of our hives had swarmed. Thankfully, after collecting the swarm, I was able to get to the first meeting at 2pm which was about grants for voluntary organisations, though I had to take my lunch with me. The second meeting was at 3pm and was a presentation about the Great Exhibition of the

For a long time, I have assumed that a soft Brexit was all but assured. This was because 1). it is blatantly clear that May is engineering one and 2). either the ERG bunch don't feel they have the power to remove her, don't want to and are thus happy to settle for a soft Brexit (for now) for fear of ruining Brexit altogether, or even possibly that they don't see what she's doing and are still naively listening to what she says as opposed to watching what she does. However, the real possibility of a hard, no deal Brexit ...

Just when we thought things couldn't get any more messed up on the international stage, the US President throws a hissy-fit, attacks all his allies and then jets off for a cosy tête à tête with his sworn enemy. The world is clearly a much more dangerous place when the leader of its most powerful nation continues to act like a petulant child who insists on getting his own way. And whilst I wish Trump every success in disarming the Korean peninsula, I wonder what it is he thinks he is going to achieve by imposing trade tariffs on goods ...

We're glad to see that there is visibly less mud on Westerleigh Road from the tipping at Beech Hill Farm. The road is generally being kept pretty clear, though there have been occasional lapses. On the Chedworth side the Network Rail works are still at a standstill following main contractors Carillion going into bankruptcy. The good news is that Network Rail have appointed a contractor for the remaining 4 weeks work, so we hope to see an improvement there soon. On the the project to electrify the main line, the Besom Lane temporary compound just across the footbridge from Shire ...

I watched the Thorpe scandal on the BBC series A Very English Scandal with a great deal of emotion. In fact, at the end of the last programme, I found myself in tears - and I've been wondering why ever since. It was, of course, brilliantly directed, written and acted - and also brilliantly evocative of [...] The post Jeremy Thorpe and the military coup appeared first on Radix.

The vast Maghull East development site as seen from Poverty Lane, Maghull Cllr. John Pugh is the Opposition Leader on Sefton Council. This is his press release following a Sefton Council Planning Committee 'wobble' regarding housing development sites in the Borough last week:- ***** The decision last week by Sefton council to delay giving the final go-ahead to housing development in Southport could give hope to Maghull and Lydiate residents facing massive housing expansion in the area. A combination of people power and sound argument at last Wednesday's planning committee prevented the usual rubber stamping of a planned housing development ...

The death of the great British high street is an event rarely out of the popular press, and it has been so for a decade. Mary Portas was appointed in a hail of publicity by David Cameron to find ways to save the high street as far back as 2011, nothing came of that and the problem has become much worse since the increase in business rates introduced last year, the creation of the national living wage and the dent to consumer sentiment caused by the UK's vote to leave the European Union. Now I quite like the national living ...

Is this a necessary cut or just a cruel cut? Shropshire Council is scheming to reduce the minimum income guarantee for the neediest adults. Of course, budgets are tight. Other councils pay less to needy people than Shropshire. So as always, Shropshire Council is following the pack to the back rather than leading from the front. We should support the most vulnerable and impoverished in our society, not pay council executives more. We have seen this argument before. A few months ago, Conservative councillors decided that those struggling on benefit should pay 20% of their council tax. The argument ran ...

This great weather has to be taken advantage of so I have been out on my bike every day recently riding through Netherton, Aintree Village, Lunt, Thornton, Sefton Village, Maghull, Lydiate, Melling, Aughton, Down Holland, Bickerstaff etc. Saturday saw me in a cycle race. Well that's putting it a little strongly as I found myself cycling the same road in the same direction as what looked like a professional cycling outfit. They were very polite as they whistled past me doing twice my speed at least. This happened on Prescot Road in Aughton – I think I came 117th out ...